Apple Music is gaining steam, but it can't catch Spotify

Apple Music just hit a milestone. On Wednesday, the iPhone maker announced that its music streaming service hit the 20 million paid subscriber mark. For an app that launched 18 months ago and has no full free tier, that’s pretty good!

However, as this chart from Statista shows, Apple Music’s most formidable competitor, Spotify, has kept growing right alongside it. Though Spotify did get a seven-year and 20 million subscriber head start on Apple’s service, it’s doubled its paid user base in the same time frame.

If anything, Spotify might be growing faster than Apple Music, since that 40 million number was announced in September.

Still, even if Apple can’t catch Spotify just yet, it can at least take solace in the fact that it’s way ahead of every other competitor. More and more, the music streaming world is becoming a two-horse race.